Snyder ends Israel trade trip to push Medicaid expansion

By CHARLES CRUMM

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Gov. Rick Snyder on Wednesday cut short his trade trip to Israel to return home and lobby reluctant fellow Republicans to expand Medicaid to more Michigan adults, as the clock ticked before lawmakers break for the summer.

"The governor makes a very strong case and we feel that he'll be able to make that strong case in person," Lt. Gov. Brian Calley told reporters toward the end of a long Senate session Wednesday night, when senators adjourned without voting on Medicaid expansion for the second straight day. "He spent a lot of time on the phone with people today, but it's a big enough issue for him that he has decided to cut the trade mission short by several days in order to manage the issue on the ground."

Snyder was expected to be back by midmorning today, Calley said. He had been planning to return Saturday.

Democrats and Republicans in the GOP-controlled House teamed up to approve Medicaid expansion legislation last week. But the Senate's Republican leader is having trouble finding at least half of the chamber's 26 Republicans to support proceeding with a vote -- the traditional threshold.

Expanding Medicaid coverage for the low-income and poor in Michigan is part of the federal Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, and puts the Republican governor at odds with tea party Republicans who remain opposed to an expansion of the federal government into health care.

Snyder had made an expansion of Medicaid a budget priority earlier this year, but state lawmakers recently passed a state budget that didn't include the expansion.

But for Snyder, the expansion makes good financial and health sense.

"This is something, done the right way, where we'd move people from an uncontrolled, unmanaged system, where they go to the emergency room, to a primary care relationship, where they can have a physician relationship, they can get physicals, they can get immunizations, and hopefully avoid those ER visits and be healthier overall, which saves all of us money," Snyder said prior to his departure to the Middle East. "It makes their quality of life better and it saves society money, so I view this, done right, as a savings to society.

"And I think there's very broad-based support from the business community to individuals to small business," the governor said. "I think the hospitals, the health plans, most people, are clearly behind putting a plan like this in place."

Snyder estimates using federal money to expand Medicaid coverage to people up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level will mean health coverage for more than 400,000 state residents and a 46 percent reduction in the number of uninsured.

A Senate Fiscal Agency analysis of the bill sent to the Senate by the House concludes that even as federal money to support the expansion is gradually decreased, it'll still take 15 years before the state's cost of expanding Medicaid in Michigan exceeds the savings the state will generate.

In southeast Michigan, that could mean a lot to nearly 500,000 with no health coverage in Oakland, Wayne, Macomb and Washtenaw counties.

The nonprofit Enroll America, using statistics from the federal government's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, estimates there are 112,695 uninsured in Oakland County, 100,485 in Macomb County, 257,798 in Wayne County, and 22,539 in Washtenaw County.